Skelos: Thanks To GOP And Cuomo, Albany Works Again

ICYMI: Here’s Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, insisting during a CapTon interview last night that his conference was not “steamrolled” by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, but rather served as a vital partner with him in landing an (almost) budget deal that would not have materialized had the Democrats been in control.

Skelos rejected the idea that Cuomo threatened the Legislature into submission by holding the extender bill option over lawmakers’ heads, saying:

“Bottom line here: There was communication. There wasn’t yelling and screaming. When you shout at each other, you don’t hear what the other person is saying. Then you’re not listening to each other.”

That sounded to me like a dis on former Gov. Eliot Spitzer, who was, of course, the self-professed steamroller, although he was more often than not rolled by the Legislature – particularly Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.

I asked Skelos if he agreed with the characterization by the DN’s Ken Lovett of Cuomo as a functioning steamroll, and he replied:

“I don’t believe so, and I don’t think he really wants to be referred to this way. He had a vision as to what direction this state should go. He proposed that in his February budget and also in his March amendments. We have a $132 billion budget, $132.5, and we’ve stayed within that framework – the Legislature and the governor.”

“I believe it’s the government functioning. There’s a lot of talk about dysfunction in Albany, and I’m removing the ‘dys’ part of that, and we are now functioning.”

Skelos touted how the Legislature adhered to the provisions of the Budget Reform Act of 2007, which was “ignored” when the Democrats controlled the chamber, adding: “Now we’ve seen that the chaos that existed for two years is gone, and government is functioning as it should, and – right now – with a bipartisan basis.”

Note the key phrase “right now” in that sentence…interesting.

Throughout the budget battle, Skelos has been striving to cast himself and his conference as close to Cuomo in an attempt to box out the speaker – something the governor seemed all too happy to indulge during the final days of negotiations when he met several times alone with the majority leader.

Nick Confessore writes in today’s Times about how Silver’s power has been diminished under Cuomo – a theory that has angered people around the speaker, if not the man himself (he generally plays cards very close to the vest).

But a former assemblyman warned me: “Don’t count Shelly out.” And it’s true, the man is a survivor. And there are still several rounds to be played in this legislative session – on ethics, rent control, redistricting and a property tax cap, just to name a few.

And next year, when the Legislature is up for re-election, don’t expect the same dynamic to repeat itself. Cuomo is, after all, a Democrat at the end of the day. And he did help some Democratic candidates during the 2010 cycle, albeit perhaps not as aggressively as say, Spitzer, did – particularly when it comes to the Senate.

Of course, unless the Legislature figures out how to get around the extender problem, it’s hard to see how lawmakers get more leverage over Cuomo than they had this time around. We shall see.